


it's a brighter wound

by ODed_on_jingle_jangle



Category: Dare Me (TV 2019), Dare Me - Megan Abbott
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Tragedy, Canon - Book & Movie Combination, Canonical Character Death, Complicated Relationships, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dreams and Nightmares, F/F, Graphic Description of Corpses, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Mental Health Issues, Non-Linear Narrative, Overdosing, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:26:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23920786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ODed_on_jingle_jangle/pseuds/ODed_on_jingle_jangle
Summary: They barrel through the stoplight at NASCAR speeds, into the sea of shiny chrome cars zooming back and forth like beetles on crack. A battered military jeep smashes into them. There’s a concert of squealing tires and steel crunching like cola cans. Addy flies right through the windshield and Beth screams and screams, her lungs have no limit, she won’t— can’t stop screaming—With a jolt, Beth wakes, gasping for air.No one is screaming.It’s just the alarm on her phone, blaring its racket to tell her it’s time to rise n’ shine.
Relationships: Beth Cassidy/Addy Hanlon
Comments: 49
Kudos: 81





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please heed the tags. Unpleasant, uncomfortable content ahead. 
> 
> I normally don't like uploading things unfinished. I prefer to do one-shots or collections more than multi-chap stuff, it's just more my speed. But the last time I uploaded a nearly 19k work, it was a fucking mess. Just loaded with fucking typos and ugly, awkward sentences. And I think...I think this one is going to end up being about as long as that. So I decided to break down and post it as smaller chunks instead, in the hope I'll catch more typos and it won't be as big of a mess. 
> 
> Got the title from a song.

They’re in Coach’s car together and Addy is driving at a breakneck speed, wearing these heart-shaped sunglasses tinted rosy red, baggy sweater sleeve drooping down her bruised shoulder. 

“Slow down,” Beth demands, irate. 

“Chill out,” Addy scoffs, accelerating just to be contrary. 

“At least put your fucking seatbelt on,” Beth snaps, as her own seatbelt bites painfully tight into her skin. 

“I don’t need it,” Addy dismisses. “You just need to relax, Beth. And _I_ need you to relax, god. I’m so sick of fighting.” 

“Well, it’s your fault,” Beth tells her sharply. “I don’t want to be here, Addy. I never asked to go. You’re the one who made me get in the car.” 

“It’s a nice car,” Addy mutters, as if it’s that matters, as if it’s as simple as that even though it’s anything but. 

“It’s _her_ car,” Beth reproachfully reminds her. 

“So what if it’s her car?” Addy huffs, exasperated.

“We shouldn’t be in Colette’s car!” Beth throws her hands up. “Damn it, Addy— Addy, slow down! It’s a red light, Addy, slow down!” 

Beth hasps at the rapidly approaching traffic light, the red like Addy’s sunglasses, bright, blaring red, louder than a firetruck siren. 

“Addy!” she’s shrieking now, desperate. “Addy, slow down! Addy, we have to stop!” 

“I can’t!” 

Addy turns to Beth, panic engulfing her face as she pumps the breaks to no avail. Behind the tinted lenses, her eyes are big as moons. 

“Beth, there’s no breaks! I can’t stop!” 

They barrel through the stoplight at NASCAR speeds, into the sea of shiny chrome cars zooming back and forth like beetles on crack. A battered military jeep smashes into them. There’s a concert of squealing tires and steel crunching like cola cans. Addy flies right through the windshield and Beth screams and screams, her lungs have no limit, she won’t— can’t stop screaming— 

With a jolt, Beth wakes, gasping for air. 

No one is screaming. 

It’s just the alarm on her phone, blaring its racket to tell her it’s time to rise n’ shine. 

Beth hastily grabs for it, fumbles, spits a curse as the fails to swipe it off. It’s gonna make her ears bleed, goddamnit. On the second try she gets it. The thing silences and she throws it across the room anyway, watches it sail and bounce harmlessly in a pile of dirty laundry. 

She swallows, squeezing her hands into a fists as she continues to shake, cold sweat slipping down her back. It’s like her body is still shocked from the dream, hasn’t caught up with the reality that it was just a dream. If dreams are ever really just dreams. 

Beth chokes back the morbid thought, grimly reminded of nightmares past. Aunt Lou twisting her neck like an owl at the breakfast table. Sandy Hayes from soccer camp with a stark white sheet over her face. Corporeal Kurtz grinning up at her as the blood poured from his mouth, arms wrapped around her leg like thorny vines. 

Beth gets up and retrieves her phone, pulling up her messages with Addy. 

> _Here I am, Pinetop Ct, looking at ur open garage door, but where’s ur car? Hmmm…_
> 
> _Last read at 5:53 AM._

Well. Addy read her texts, at least. She never replied so evidently she’s still ignoring Beth, but whatever. Knowing she’s read them makes her feel a little bit better anyway. 

But just a little bit. 

* * *

Addy isn’t in class, which is unusual, but not alarming. It wouldn’t be, anyway, if Beth wasn’t unsettled from her dream. 

She shoots Addy a text.

Then another. 

Then another. 

Then another.

Waits for them not to be replied to, but seen. At least seen, like the ones from last night. They never are, and Beth’s apprehension grows. 

Addy missing class is one thing. She skips class now and then. Beth does too. Before everything changed, they would skip together. Shoplift from the gas station or the convenience store. Fuck around in abandoned buildings or go for drives to nowhere. 

But practice is not class. Addy never, ever misses practice. But they’ve already made it through jumping jacks and planks, and she still isn’t here. Beth’s stomach sinks, but she keeps herself outwardly assembled as her mind races, haphazardly trying to place where Addy might be, ponders what Addy could possibly be doing that would matter more to her than practice. 

There’s only one thing Beth can think of that could woo Addy out of practice and that thing is here, blonde hair swept back in a ponytail and clipboard in hand. 

Then Colette calls her over, beckoning to Beth like she’s a dog. Beth grits her teeth but approaches anyway, arms folded in annoyance. 

“What?” 

“Where’s Hanlon?” 

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” she fires back, studying her coach’s face, searching for cracks in its cryptic mask. “She was with you last night, wasn’t she?” 

Beth had sent Addy her last text at 2:27 AM exactly, looking into Addy’s empty garage as she crawled by in her Jeep and knowing there was only one person Addy would be with that late besides herself. 

“No,” Colette says, her voice dry ice. “I spent last night with family. When you see Hanlon, tell her she can’t make a habit out of this. I know she can do better, I expect more of her than this bullshit.” 

“Tell her yourself,” Beth replies, clipped. “You’ll probably see her before I do.” 

With that, she whips around and pelts away, powering into a hurdler jump she’s been perfecting out of view of the others. For one moment she is weightless, one leg stretched into a superb toe touch and the other nimbly bent beneath her, parallel to the laminated gym floor. The weightlessness passes and she snaps her legs together as gravity resumes, feet hitting the floor, fists flat to her sides. 

Beth straightens and lets the reactions of the others wash over her, RiRi’s endearment, Cori’s secretly impressed roll of the eyes, Tacy silent and sullen like a toddler in timeout. She turns back over her shoulder to regard Colette. 

Colette drums her fingers against the clipboard, meeting her gaze across the gap that separates them. 

“Use your arms more next time,” she calls out, “you’ll have better momentum.” 

“Fuck you, that was flawless,” Beth bites caustically. 

Colette’s fingers stop drumming, eyes flashing like a dragon’s. Beth almost expects her to spew fire from her mouth and braces herself like a knight with an invisible shield. But Colette’s jaw only clenches hard, and Beth thinks she catches one of the cracks in the mask she was looking for. 

Something is off. 

She knows it, she feels it, she smells it. 

It’s not like Colette to do this, to grind her teeth and glare instead of snarling rebuttals. Not like her to refrain from jumping down Beth’s throat, to turn down the opportunity of making an example of her before the sheep. Just as much as its unlike Addy to skip practice entirely. 

Beth wonders if they finally fucked. If they were practicing at night again in the Frenchs’s backyard. If Colette saw how perfect Addy’s smile looked under the starlight and pounced like a cougar right then and there. If Addy realized it wasn’t how she thought it’d be at all, if she tasted Colette’s venom when they swapped saliva and couldn’t bring herself to face its aftermath today. 

The more she thinks about it, the more Beth becomes convinced that’s what happened. Addy isn’t here. Colette is but she’s not herself, and the next time Beth flies across the floor in a fluid front handspring, she doesn’t say a word. The way she leads the practice is so mechanical too, directing them into drills and exercises without any of those pep talks that sound more like threats, the ones that have these dumb bitches eating out the palm of her hand. 

Beth didn’t see Sarge Stud at the recruitment table today, either. If Will isn’t here either, maybe he was apart of whatever happened. Maybe he walked in on them and flipped out. Kurtz was always pretty adamant that the sarge would make a scene if he caught any of his men doing jailbait. Would the same rules apply to his own forbidden paramour?

Addy’s car was gone at 2:30AM and there’s no person she’d be with that late besides Beth or Colette. And it wasn’t Beth, which means it was Colette. And what, what on earth would they possibly be doing together that late when the rest of the world was asleep? 

Under the cover of night, swathed in shadows, able to do things no one would dare in the daylight?

Oh, they fucked, they must’ve fucked. Beth roils with anxiety as she thinks about it, as she irresistibly pictures it, Colette’s red polished nails scratching up and down Addy’s back, tearing up her lovely brown skin. It makes Beth sick to her stomach, but she can’t think of anything else that would be bad enough to scare Addy away from practice. 

Addy is the most dedicated of them all. She wants to get to States more than anyone. Addy would stomp on throats and bend over backwards a thousand times over just to make it into the top ten. 

Beth is positive they fucked and that Addy is at home, buried under the covers, overwhelmed and distraught by the mess of it all. By what Beth’s sure she quickly realized wasn’t the sparkling fantasy her mooning bedroom eyes had wanted all along. By actually going there and discovering reality was another fucking thing entirely, a hazardous whirlpool she’s found herself drowning in. 

Now it’s Beth’s job to throw Addy a raft. She’s still angry, but angry or not, she has to be there for her. That’s just how they are, and it’s something Addy’s been forgetting lately, but Beth hasn’t forgotten it at all. And maybe, now that she’s presumably got what she thought she wanted and it fucking backfired on her, she’ll be willing to open her eyes and take Beth’s hand. 

When practice is over, Beth takes a quick shower, figuring she’ll go straight to Addy’s place. Maybe Addy won’t want her there. She hasn’t been answering Beth’s texts. But if Addy and Colette really did fuck— and Beth is 99% sure they did —then Beth might not be the reason she’s avoiding her phone. 

Maybe Addy won’t want her there anyway. Maybe she’ll yell or she won’t, and her silence will be deafening anyway. Or maybe she’ll bawl like a baby and pull Beth into bed with her. Maybe Beth will press close as Addy clutches her hand to her chest in an desperate death grip. 

Beth runs through the different scenarios in her head as she packs her stuff up and slings her backpack over her shoulder. Wonders what Addy will want to do about Colette after, if anything. 

She walks across the parking lot and throws her backpack in the back of her Jeep, when Faith Hanlon’s cruiser suddenly pulls up beside her. The window rolls down and bewildered, Beth pokes her head inside. She doesn’t even have a chance to offer a greeting, as Faith rushes out a question. 

“Beth, do you know where Addy is?” 

Faith looks frazzled, eyes wide, panic threading her normally placid demeanor as she jitters in her seat like a woman who guzzled a whole Starbucks’s worth of coffee. 

Beth blinks rapidly, narrowing her eyes. 

“Wait, Addy isn’t at home?” 

“No,” Faith says, unnerved. “I got up at five and her car was already gone. I assumed she left early to get some extra practice in, or something, she— she does that sometimes. But the school left me a message saying she never showed up, and I can’t get ahold of her.” 

A cold feeling creeps under Beth’s skin, little hairs prickling on the back of her neck like the scurry of spider legs. 

“I don’t know where she is, Miss H. I haven’t seen her since practice yesterday.” 

Faith squeezes the steering wheel, lips pursing as she glances through the windshield and then back to Beth. 

“Have you talked to her at all?” 

“Not since practice yesterday,” Beth hesitates for a moment before adding, “she hasn’t been answering my texts.” 

Faith shakes her head back and forth, covers her mouth with her hand, then releases an agitated breath. 

“Do you have any idea where she might be?” 

Château French is the first place that comes to mind, but Beth bites her tongue. Addy would be pissed if she let that one slip to her mom. There are enough problems between her and Addy as is. Why add another one?

“No,” she answers, that cold feeling spreading further and deeper. 

“Well, if you think of anything or if you see her, call me. Okay, Beth? You have my number, right?” 

“Yeah…you don’t think anything happened to her?” 

“No,” Faith says immediately. Then there’s a pause, a fraction of a second where her lips tremble before the words come out. “I don’t think so but this really isn’t like her. Sure, she’s been playing the disappearing act on me these days, but never for this long. And she never skips practice.” 

“No,” Beth agrees. “She doesn’t.” 

“I’m going to keep looking around.” 

“Okay.” Beth retracts her head from the open window and steps back. “Let me know if you find her.” 

Faith nods and forces a tense smile. Then she rolls the window up and pulls out of the parking lot, and Beth is left perplexed and anxious. That uneasy coldness washes through her insides and she climbs into the driver’s seat, wracking her brain for answers. 

Could Addy actually be at Château French? 

But why would she stay if Colette left? 

Did something else happen? 

What else could it even be?

Beth turns the key and listens to the engine, feels it thrum. She opens her phone and sees that the last string of texts she sent Addy remains unread. Gnawing her lip, Beth sends another one. 

> _Where the fuck are you?_

* * *

Beth drives around for awhile, aimless and anxious, going up and down side streets, eyes peeled for Addy. She swings by the Dairy Cream and Slocum confirms Addy had a shift she didn’t show up for. It’s actually why he’s there, he originally had the day off but got called in when she didn’t show. 

The hours crawl by. 

Addy never texts her back. Faith never calls to say she found her. The only notifications Beth gets are from the rest of the squad, wondering where Addy is. 

This isn’t normal. 

This really isn’t normal. 

Images from Beth’s dream keep stabbing into her head. The vivid red of Coach’s sunglasses on Addy’s face, the same red as the stoplight they sped right through. The same red that flew from Addy’s body like rose petals in the air as the shards of windshield glass shredded her skin. 

Beth swears she can feel the glass in her throat, the tiniest of fragments embedded into the meat of her windpipe and catching like thorns on her nervous breaths. She’s trying not to have a panic attack, trying to extinguish its rising in her chest like a dorsal fin cutting through still waters. 

But she keeps seeing her dream, her horrible, horrible dream so foreboding like her other horrible, horrible dreams. Aunt Lou. Sandy Hayes. Kurtz. Only one of those three people is still alive and it’s the only one she wants fucking dead. 

_You’re being paranoid,_ she tells herself, sure it’s what Addy would say if Addy was here. _You’re scared and it’s making you spin out. You need to calm down._

No one is dead. Something weird is going on, but no one is dead. That’s the fear talking, her stupid paranoia. Beth pulls over to the side of the road and tries to catch her breath. 

She can’t stop the panic attack but she can ride it out. So she does, forcing herself to take full, deep breaths as her hands shake and chills chase up and down her spine. Her heartbeat pounds like a hammer in her chest, hard and fast as her head spins dizzily. 

She’s just being paranoid. She’s going to find Addy and they’re going to hash it out and she’s probably going to have her heart broken again, but at this point, Beth’s had her heart broken so many times she hardly remembers the feeling of it whole. Colette probably did something to burn Addy like Beth always knew she would and Addy took off because she couldn’t face her and she wasn’t ready to breakdown in front of Beth either, couldn’t bring herself to beg Beth to lick her wounds. 

It’s typical shit, like that. Nothing crazy. It was just a dream. No one is dead. Beth’s phone buzzes and she quickly grabs it, heart soaring in the hope that it’s Addy. 

It’s not. It’s RiRi in the group chat. 

> _Keep it on the DL cuz I’m not supposed to tell but I’ve got awful news…Sarge Will killed himself, no lie. Tibbs found his body an hr ago ☹_

The phone slips from Beth’s hands and bounces off the gear shift, clattering to the floor. 

* * *

The day Sarge Will’s death hits the public news is the same day Addy is officially declared missing.

No way it’s a fucking coincidence. 

There is a common link here, a link with wavy blonde hair and eyes like steel, and there’s not a single doubt in Beth’s mind that she did something. Did everything, possibly. Put the gun right to Will’s forehead and pulled the trigger, even? 

Yeah. Absolutely. The more Beth thinks about it, the more it makes sense. Colette could have a myriad of motives. If Matt found out about the affair, if Will wanted more than she was willing to give, if Will caught her fucking Addy— Addy, Addy is the missing piece to this puzzle, the key to this mystery that no one but Beth seems to see. 

Addy wouldn’t run away if she saw Will kill himself. She wouldn’t have any reason to. It’d be a gruesome sight, to be sure, but it wouldn’t be an event that could put her in danger. 

But if Addy saw Colette kill him? If Addy witnessed a murder? 

Of course she’d run away. Of course she’d dump her phone. She’d have no choice, really. 

Beth snoops around the tenements, doesn’t find much. The only thing she really finds out is that the person who might have something she can use is the very last person she wants to see. That fucking walking filth in camouflage. She’d rather swallow cockroaches whole than look into his lupine eyes and feel herself rip inside out. 

But it’s for Addy. 

It’s for Addy so she has to. There just…isn’t any other option. 

So Beth finds Kurtz even though she’s shaking, even though being alone with him does disgusting things to her stomach and wretched things to her soul, and makes her feel like her heart’s pumping sludge instead of blood. Puts her on edge like she’s got fire ants scurry, scurry, scurrying beneath her skin, hatefully, furiously itching. 

Beth makes him talk to her and Jesus, just his voice sounds like bile. She’s glad the table separates them so he can’t see her legs trembling. So that he can't know she still feels the ache of the wounds in her tongue. So he can’t know that even when she has the upper hand with files of that bloody tongue stored on her laptop she is afraid, so fucking afraid it wrings her of her strength and makes her want to cry like a colicky infant. Afraid and angry, so utterly, viciously angry it awakens something inside her she doesn’t even want to have, something that just fucking craves whatever Colette felt when she surely put the gun to Will’s head and— 

“So you saw her there that night,” Beth repeats to confirm. 

“Yeah.” Kurtz bobs his head. 

“How about Addy?” 

“Who?” 

“Addy,” Beth repeats. “My best friend. You’re always staring at her legs.” 

_And I want to fucking slaughter you for it._

“Oh, her. Yeah, s-she was there too. Showed up later than your coach did, but she was there all right.” 

Beth exhales through her nose, assimilating this without surprise. Of course Addy was there, Addy would’ve had to be there. Addy was always with Colette. 

“About what time was that?” 

“Uh…I dunno.” Kurtz squints uncertainly. “Maybe ten? Eleven?” 

“Are you sure?” It’s earlier than Beth would’ve thought, considering the time she noticed Addy’s car gone. 

“Not really. Sorry.” He gives an apologetic wince and Beth wants to strangle him, wants to spit in his eye, wants to sob and almost hates herself for it. 

“Okay. That’s all I needed.” 

There’s a long pause where he’s just staring at her blankly, and Beth can’t think with his eyes on her, can’t think with him breathing a table away. 

“You can go,” she dismisses flatly. 

“Oh.” Kurtz heads for the door, pauses when he reaches for the handle and looks back over his shoulder. “So we’re good then, right?” 

And the way he asks makes it sound like he actually thinks it’s within the realm of possibility. Beth feels like she’s just been kicked in the stomach. She swallows it down and looks away, focusing her attention on the wood grain in the table. 

“I need to find my friend,” she says, and it’s the only thing she can say that actually matters. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does this also count as leaning more into Dare Me's noir elements?
> 
> Partly inspired by the semi-psychic dreams Beth has in the book.
> 
> Edit: Fixed some typos and rearranged some oddly worded sentences for clarity.


	2. Chapter 2

Addy looks good in everything but she pulls off bright colors like no one else can. She’s striking in neon, limes and tangerines, magentas and cyans. She’s beautiful in this lemon yellow ballgown, the skirt fanning around her svelte legs like an upside-down tulip as she twirls Beth across the floor. 

Beth doesn’t even know where the music’s coming from, but she knows she could dance with Addy like this forever. Addy’s eyes glow warm, her smile as soft as the first rays of morning sunshine. Beth laughs as light as air, enveloped by pure love. 

“Twirl me again, Addy,” she bubbles, beaming. “Twirl me again.” 

Addy twirls her again and then— 

Then she lets go. 

Beth stumbles, turning in confusion. Addy isn’t there anymore. She just disappeared. 

“Time for me to take over.” 

Beth turns to see Colette strutting forward, dressed in her own blood red ballgown, matching red dahlia tucked in her hair. She takes Beth’s hand without asking and yanks her into a dance. 

“Where’s Addy?” Beth splutters, startled as Colette twists around her with serpentine ease, dipping her and holding her a hairsbreadth from the pearly marble before jerking her up again.

Colette rolls her eyes. “Pay attention, Cassidy, you just missed a step.” 

“What the fuck did you do to her?” 

“We’ll get to that later, the music’s still going, we have to put on a show.” Colette abruptly raises her arm and twirls Beth so fast she nearly loses her balance. 

“Let go of me!” Beth forces herself from Colette’s grip mid-spin, stumbling free. 

She trips into a broad chest and finds herself trapped in burly arms, gazing up into a predatory wolf grin. 

“What’s good, jailbait?” 

Horror devours every inch of her and Beth finds she can’t speak, mouth gone dry. 

“I’m not one for dancing,” Kurtz chuckles darkly. “I like to cut to the chase.” 

He cups her cheek and Beth recoils from the cactus touch, tries to shrink away but has nowhere to go, unable to wrest herself from his arm like an iron band around her waist. 

His hand slides lower and takes her necklace, fingers slipping beneath the thin ribbon. He gruffly jerks it off and Beth’s head falls from her shoulders. It bounces on the floor and goes rolling, she gapes in helpless horror as her decapitated body folds forward, blood spilling over the floor that is no longer the marble of the ballroom, but the lacquered hardwood of the gym. 

“Don’t find yourself in situations you can’t handle,” Colette’s voice taunts all around her, everywhere, drowning out the music. 

Beth can’t see her anymore, can’t see Kurtz either. All she can she is the blood. 

Beth jerks awake in a cold sweat. The nightmare fades before her eyes and leaves her gasping at the ceiling. Her heart pounds in her ears, pulse racing as if she’s just ran a marathon. 

Beth gulps and glances to the clock. 4:20 AM. Well that’s a laugh. Or if would be, if Beth wasn’t ice cold and quivering. She forces herself to stop, balls her hands into fists. Tries to dredge up enough anger to chase back the fear. 

She thinks of her conversation with Kurtz yesterday. It was mostly pumping him for information, but there was that moment when he saw her picture where he spooked, started scrambling, grasping for defense. 

_“I— I did— I didn’t know— I— I didn’t.”_

And Beth shut him down. 

_“You did.”_

Of course he did. Who the fuck can split someone open without meaning to? 

Who the fuck can plow themselves inside another person accidentally? 

Even if he was blackout drunk like she was— which she sure as fuck does not believe —well, why the hell should that matter? 

He still did it. It still happened. What Kurtz was or wasn’t matters not shit, doesn’t make her nightmares any less terrifying, doesn’t change the way she has to slink around the recruitment table on eggshells every single school day, doesn’t change the foul feeling that finds her sometimes, that pierces her as unexpectedly as his penis had and burrows inside like a parasite, telling her she’s nothing, nothing, nothing, because if she was something, well surely someone would’ve cared…

That feeling is with her right now, worming its way up from the pit of her gut and into her chest, weaving through her ribs. 

Beth tries to squelch it as she gets up, changing into a tank top and tights. She slips out of her house and into the night, going for a run. She can’t go back to sleep, not with the images of her dream still emblazoned on the back of her eyelids and the presence of the parasite she’s trying not to listen to. 

She runs and she runs, block after block, some distant part of her hoping that Addy will pop up like a toaster pastry and join her in stride. Some part of her would die to have Addy beside her now. To hear the familiar rhythm of Addy’s tennis shoes on the concrete, to turn and see the plumes of Addy’s breath in the cool, crisp air. 

Beth runs and runs until her lungs burn like fire. And she goes home only because she has nowhere else to go. 

* * *

  
Beth didn’t have every class with Addy, but in every class they did share, her empty seat feels like an open wound Beth can’t tend. 

She feels Addy’s absence down to her very eyeteeth, and she bears them in smiles to conceal her weakness. Floats through her classes like a butterfly who stings, the beautiful freak of nature the whole school adores and fears her for being. Murmurs and wonderings of Addy whisper through the halls, the hottest topic of the week second to the late sarge’s suicide. 

Most are wise enough to silence themselves when Beth walks by, but she catches snippets of the gossip anyway. Some say she met an older guy online and ran off to be with him. It must be the most ridiculous thing Beth has ever heard. The idea that Addy would do anything of the sort for a man. 

Beth supposes she can see why the rumor would crop up though. It’s the kind of story you see all the time, shows, books, and movies chock full of the supposed romance in girls and women so dedicated to men, they’ll go above and beyond, even alter their lives at the drop of a hat. Give everything, everything, until they’ve got nothing left to give just to taste their love. 

Since Addy’s disappearance coincided with Sarge Stud’s (supposed) suicide, there’s even speculation the two go hand-in-hand. That they were in love and without him, Addy couldn’t go on. Either offed herself after the fact or ran away so she wouldn’t have to be reminded of him every day in Sutton Grove. That gig’s a riot too, makes Beth want to share the video of Colette riding Will’s dick in the woods. 

She won’t though. In an odd kind of way, Beth feels sorry for the sarge, wouldn’t quite be comfortable with airing his dirty laundry mere days after he bit the dust. But more important, she needs to hold onto the footage in case she needs it later. Addy is still missing, Colette is still acting weird, and Beth still needs answers. 

She hasn’t made much headway since getting what she could out of Kurtz. 

The video might be enough to get something out of Colette. The only reason she hasn’t used it yet is because she feels like she needs to play her cards right. Colette can be tricky, Beth isn’t sure if she’ll get anywhere going at her with guns blazing. 

Admittedly it’s getting hard to hold off with every minute that passes, every painful heartbeat of Addy’s absence. 

Beth is beginning to get desperate. 

She texts Addy over and over in the vain hope she’ll get a response, even though it’s become clear that wherever Addy is, she’s dumped her phone. 

It wasn’t like Beth hadn’t been missing her already. The moment Colette showed up, the problems between her and Addy reached a zenith. Addy wrenched herself away from Beth and it was like that time Beth had accidentally superglued her thumb to Tacy’s pillowcase in the midst of a prank gone awry. Neither soapy water nor butter could get it off, so Beth just yanked the digit free, ripping the flesh raw in the process. 

Beth had been missing Addy since the second Colette became the cynosure of Addy’s world. But at least she’d been here. At least Beth could glance over and see her, and see that she was here. At least Beth could discreetly behold her beauty in the gym as she perfected her back tuck and contorted her body into the sleekest of scorpions. 

Even though she’d missed her, even though they were fighting, at least Beth had been able to look over and know Addy was okay. 

But now Beth doesn’t have any idea where she is or if she’s okay, if she’s safe. If she’s sleeping in her car in sketchy rest stop parking lots. If she’s scared for her life and jolting awake from nightmares in cold sweats, just like Beth. Or if she’s even— 

No. 

Beth will not let her thoughts go there. The only dead body is Will’s. 

But something strange is going on and Beth knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that Colette is at the center of it. She watches her like a hawk during practice, watches those fingers drum against that clipboard. Catches the nervous flick of her tongue over her lips. Listens to her irritated huffs of breath, takes note of her shorter temper. 

Colette’s always been a ball buster, been a battle axe since she stepped through the door. She’s never been a patient coach, but the past few days, she blows her top at every mistake that isn’t Beth’s. Breathes her fire all over the livestock that won’t fight back, but bites her tongue when Beth breaks routine to show off her tumbles or dexterous poses. Either because she knows it’d be a waste of breath or because she can feel Beth studying her, measuring her every move. 

“Coach, coach!” Tacy asks, cutting through Beth’s thoughts as her hand shoots up in the air. “If Addy doesn’t come back before States, can I have her part?” 

Beth gasps, taken aback. Her blood burns like lava and Beth is a breath away from erupting before Colette scoffs dismissively. 

“God, no. You don’t have the strength or the stamina.” Colette swallows, raising her head as her gaze sweeps over the squad. “If Addy…if Addy doesn’t return in time for States, Brianna takes her part. We’re going to plan on Addy being here, but Brianna, you should begin practicing just in case.” 

Brianna gasps, punching the air. She looks like she’s about to dance for joy and then she catches Beth staring, and quickly stills, solemnly bowing her head. 

Later, Beth pulls Tacy’s ponytail until her crocodile tears turn to real tears flowing over cherry red cheeks. Then she takes the full bag out of the cafeteria garbage can and dumps it into Brianna’s backpack, wrinkles her nose at the sour, rancid smell it emits.

* * *

Will Mosley’s death is publicly declared under investigation the same day it’s announced the town is organizing a search party for Addy. The picture the news uses is the one of Addy sitting on the hood of Beth’s jeep, lopsided smile on her lips and fingers raised in a ‘peace’ sign. Beth herself took the picture. Faith must’ve submitted it. 

“Damn,” RiRi whispers. “At first, I was hoping it was a prank. Like the time you and Addy rounded up your uncle’s goats and unleashed them in the school.”

“Not a prank,” Beth says, stomach sinking. “Or if it is, I’m not in on the joke.” 

“Then it’s for real, for real. Even if your marriage was on the rocks, there’s no way Addy would do something like this without you.” RiRi’s lips twitch wryly. 

“Not if she didn’t want to end up like Sarge Stud,” Beth snaps, but it falters over her lips, doesn’t have the edge she intends. 

“Too soon, Beth.” RiRi grimaces, shaking her head. 

“RiRi?” 

“Huh?” 

Beth narrows her eyes. “Do you have any pics from the parties at Coach’s place?” 

“Sure, some videos too. We had a lot of fun over there.” RiRi shrugs. “I just pulled most of them off Insta cause I figured it’d be a bad look for Coach if anybody’s parents saw us drinking at her place. I mean, I know my mom would kick both of our asses if she saw anything like that, so.” 

“Send them to me.” 

“Okay?” RiRi frowns dubiously. “Is there something you’re looking for?” 

Beth pulls the ribbon out of her hair and lets it fall free, tumbling past her shoulders. 

“Just send them to me.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will fix typos when I'm awake.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why, hello there Non-Linear Narrative tag, my dear old friend. It's been a hot minute since I've seen you, thanks for coming over.

It is Beth who finds her. 

* * *

> _Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck_
> 
> _Sent at 3:33 AM_
> 
> _I HATE YOU_
> 
> _Sent at 3:34 AM_
> 
> _I HATE YOU FOR DOING THIS TO ME_
> 
> _Sent at 3:35 AM_
> 
> _I tried to tell you! I warned you over and over and you didn’t want to fucking listen!_
> 
> _Sent at 3:36 AM_
> 
> _WHY THE FUCK DIDN’T YOU LISTEN TO ME_
> 
> _Sent at 3:37 AM_
> 
> _THISNEVERWOULDHAVEHAPPENEDIFYOUJUSTFUCKINGLISTENEDTOME_
> 
> _Sent at 3:38 AM_
> 
> _All you had to do was stay away from her!!! You just couldn't fucking stay away from her!!  
> _
> 
> _Sent at 3:39 AM_
> 
> _I always knew you would break my heart_
> 
> _Sent at 3:40 AM_
> 
> _But I never thought it would be like this_
> 
> _Sent at 3:41 AM_
> 
> _GODDAMNIT I TRIED TO PROTECT YOU_
> 
> _Sent at 3:42_
> 
> _Why wouldn’t you let me_
> 
> _Sent at 3:43 AM_
> 
> _Why her_
> 
> _Sent at 3:44 AM_
> 
> _Why fucking her_
> 
> _Sent at 3:45 AM_
> 
> _I’ll kill her I’ll fucking kill her_
> 
> _Sent at 3:46 AM_
> 
> _Forget breaking my heart, you fucking ripped it out of my chest_
> 
> _Sent at 3:47 AM_
> 
> _Chewed it up and spit it out_
> 
> _Sent at 3:48 AM_
> 
> _Look where it got you_
> 
> _Sent at 3:49 AM_
> 
> _For her, you did it for her and look where it got you_
> 
> _Sent at 3:50 AM_
> 
> _I HATE YOU FOR DOING THIS TO ME_
> 
> _Sent at 3:51 AM_
> 
> _I love you ♥︎_
> 
> _Sent at 4:00 AM_

* * *

Of course it is Beth who finds her. 

It is always Beth who finds her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updated the tags. Please heed the updated tags going forward.


End file.
